A/N: note, this happens between Mahorafest and the end of classes.

….

'Ala Alba Plays Pathfinder' or 'Never Confuse a Wizard and A Sorcerer'

by Shadow Crystal Mage

Disclaimer: The Pathfinder system is owned by Paizo. Akamatsu Ken owns Negima. I make no money of this. This is parody and protected speech.

….

Fuuka and Fumika cowered beneath the glares of righteous fury by a morally offended tsundere and an outraged class rep.

"You two," Ayaka said, "have screwed up before. Outrageous stories. Rumor mongering (and unlike Kazumi you didn't even bother to confirm)! Spying on your classmates and teachers. But this…!"

"And seriously, you guys thought I was learning to be a wizard?-!-?" Asuna exploded, her Str and Con gaining a +4 morale bonus but losing 2 AC. She didn't really need AC at the moment. "For crying out loud, it's just a game! What are you, moral guardians who can't even tell reality from fantasy?"

"Such overreaction and lack of thought is, unfortunately a habit with you two impressionable youths," said Ayaka, who was several months younger. "But this takes the cake! Even if you seriously thought there was a chance of danger, the fact that you would bring her as your backup is inexcusable!"

"No offense to you Satsuki-san, but," Asuna apologized before turning her full fury back on the twins, "she's your idea of 'bite proof'? Really? The nicest, most inoffensive girl in our class, who wouldn't hurt a fly and you think it's a bright idea to use her as a meat shield against zombies, no offense for the term Yotsuba-san. I'm a bakaranger, and even I think you two are too stupid to be a bakaranger for an idea like that!"

Ah, it's all right, Satsuki said. No harm done.

Ayaka, however, was still not done being offended on her behalf. "And not only were you thinking of putting her into what you thought was danger, but you did it just before the dinner rush! Yotsuba-san has a business to run, you thoughtless children! She has more important things to do than to waste her time on a wild goose chase with you!"

"We'll walk you back to the Chao Bao Zi, Satsuki-chan," Konoka said, figuring out the paradox of that statement and having Satsuki stand there watching the twins be harangued. "It's the least we can do after having out you through all this trouble."

Oh, you don't need to bother yourselves, Satsuki said, but accepted having Konoka and Setsuna walk her back as Ayaka and Asuna played Lawful Cop and Chaotic Cop behind them.

So, Satsuki asked, what exactly were you doing that made the twins think… I think they said Asuna was raising zombies?

"Oh, we were just playing this board game, it's called Pathfinder… " Konoka said.

Oh, 3.75 edition! Pretty nice game, though I personally prefer World of Darkness. It just feels so real and genuine, you know? It really speaks to me, Satsuki said brightly. Maybe I can join you in a game sometime.

"Sure, though you should know Yue wants to step down as GM, so if you know anyone, that'd be really helpful," Konoka said.

Satsuki tilted her head. I might know someone…

….

Game night came…

"You… want me to kill your wizard?" Yue said slowly.

"Yeah," Asuna said. "I want to roll a new one as a Necromancer specialist. Better zombies, you know?"

"But… why do you want me to kill you?" Yue asked. "I mean, you can just roll a new character. Negi can help you, he has lots of experience."

"Well, I wanna bring my old character back as a Juju Zombie, you know?" Asuna said. "That way, it doesn't go to waste!"

"You're level six," Yue said, resorting to basic math. "Juju zombies need a spell you get at level 11."

A beat.

"Can I get a wand?" Asuna asked hopefully.

"No."

"Damn. All right, don't kill my wizard then."

"No promises."

"I wonder who Satsuki-san is bringing along?" Nodoka said.

"It's too bad Satsuki will only be coming over tonight," Haruna said. "But she does have a business to run, after all."

"I'm sure it's someone nice," Konoka said. "After all, Satsuki-san wouldn't get along with a mean person."

"Doesn't Satsuki get along with Eva-chan?" Asuna said.

There was a pregnant pause that gave birth to little evil vampire pauses.

"I'm sure it's someone nice!" Konoka said, voice pitched very, very loudly. "After all, Satsuki-san wouldn't get along with a mean person!"

The doorbell rang.

….

Sister Shakti was a very nice person. They really didn't get why Misora insisted on painting her as some kind of demon.

Yue was willing to probationarily agree that maybe they'd found a co-GM she could rotate with, but she wanted to see how she played for a session or two before she handed over the reins. Shakti ("Oh, call me Ada.") was okay with that. She was even willing to humor Nodoka's pained request for a meatshield character.

And so, the party was joined that night by Elric Brian Idol the human Bladebound Magus.

The librarians, spotting the literary reference, decided that Ada Shakti was a woman of mature tastes who knew her genre history. Negi, spotting the other reference, recognized an woman of immature humor.

Yue, failing her Perception check to recognize the Monty Python ref right away, was unable to put up the prerequisite rule in time.

"Maybe we need to change locations," Yue said as they sat around talking about what they wanted to do that session. "Our party's getting too big for the kind of adventures I can come up with in a small town."

"If we're moving, then I can sell the house, right?" Nodoka said. "According to the downtime building rules– "

"I haven't forgotten you're not the one who owns the house, you know," Yue said.

"Tch," Nodoka 'tched'.

"Wait, then who does own it?" Konoka said, sounding concerned. "Should we be paying them rent?"

"Oh, the mayor is lending it to us rent-free," Haruna said. "We're her heroes on retainer, sort of thing. Plus there was this politics thing that Yue seems to have forgotten about."

"I haven't forgotten about it, you used suggestion on everyone to make it a low priority," Yue said. "But soon… "

"I'm partial towards cities," Shakti ('call me Ada' or not, it was really weird to think of her like that) said. "Preferably on the coast on a temperate region, maybe with an entrance to the darklands. Good selection of environments and monsters, and if all else fails, tarrasque attack. Or some other colossal kaiju."

"Hmm… " Yue vocalized, checking her notes. "Well, that's an option. Plus Asuna wouldn't be able to go graverobbing in a city as soon as she hits level 11…"

"Juju zombies of Negi's dead wizards just make sense!" Asuna protested.

"Horrible! You're horrible Asuna-chan!" Konoka wailed. "I thought I knew you! I thought you were a Neutral Good person! Shame on you! Shame, shame on you for thinking of desecrating the graves of my dead friends! What would Negi-kun think about you doing such things to the dozens of wizards named after his father?"

"I have no idea what you're talking about," Negi said.

Moving adventuring locations wasn't a simple matter of packing up and taking a bus (for one thing, no buses, and you wouldn't believe the rates wizards charged). First, there had to be a reason to leave town.

"Copy-cat!" Asuna swore vitriolically as Yue smugly set down the game pieces. "Copy-cat! Copy-cat! You're a thieving cat Yue! That was my idea!"

Yue did not smirk. She was too Yue to smirk. "What, they were there. And juju zombies make for a level-appropriate encounter."

"Those were supposed to be my juju zombies!" Asuna wailed. "Damn it!"

"See, this is why I prepare summoning spells too, Asuna-san" Ayaka said smugly. "Really, you don't need that much experience to know that unless you've seen the body, the necromancer cleric is still alive and coming back. Really, I've seen these movies… and TV shows… and anime… she practically waved a sequel summary at us."

"How does he have this many zombies?" Negi asked incredulously. "I've read the rules, there shouldn't be enough to cause a zombie apocalypse!"

"Oh Negi," Haruna said, patting him on the shoulder. "You need to learn this, and you might as well learn it now."

Negi looked up innocently at her.

"The GM cheats," Haruna said simply.

Negi stared at Yue, aghast.

She shrugged. "I control the universe. My bad guys don't need to have the stats to control the zombies. I control the zombies anyway."

"We fight god herself!" Haruna confirmed. "If she says the town suddenly turned into a swamp, it turns into a swamp! If she says the tarrasque appears out of thin air, it does!"

"Within reason," Yue amended.

"God plays dice with the universe!" Haruna declared.

"Oh, shut up Haruna."

There was, of course, a dramatic chase scene once the party had deactivated the artifact the necromancer had been using on the town to bring back the dead ("I told you I wasn't cheating."). Asuna had forgiven Yue reviving Negi's old characters when the shorter girl had allowed her to keep the artifact. Increased caster level when using necromantic spells and being able to control double the normal HD of zombies was nothing to sneeze at. Konoka, however, was now watching Asuna like a hawk, ready to pull a credible impersonation of 'smite evil' the moment she thought the wizard was going to do anything shady.

"You're just jealous because your alignment doesn't let you use necro spells," Asuna said.

"Good girls don't use [evil] spells," Konoka said primly. "Yue, can I still level up my cleric if I crossclass as a paladin?"

Said chase scene involved going after the villain as he flew to the big city. Well, a big city.

"Isn't that a Mahorafest directory?" Shakti said.

"It was either this or a map of Tokyo Disneyland," Yue said. "And I have bad memories of Disneyland. There was this one traumatic childhood incident where all I wanted to do was read a Nietzschean criticism on third-wave fundamental feminist philosophy and its impact on modern junior idol gravure, but I kept getting forced onto roller coasters, teacup rides, bumper cars… " Yue shuddered. "It was horrible. Worst 5th birthday a girl could have."

Somewhere, Chisame felt a chill, as if some use for her services to the world of pointing out her classmates were royally fucked up were needed…

"You're not going to do anything obvious like put a level 20, mythic halfling vampire on Sakura Lane, are you?" Haruna said.

Yue made a big show of taking down notes.

"Because if you do, I'm telling Eva-chan," Haruna threatened.

Yue paused, then made a big show of crossing out her note. "Spoilsport. "

Ayaka blinked. "McDowell-san? Why would she care?"

"Long story, I'll tell you never," Asuna murmured.

Ayaka frowned, trying to parse the end of that sentence, so Asuna threw Negi at her as a distraction.

That was the signal to go on a break.

As Asuna and Ayaka got into one of their friendship-affirming knock-down, drag out fights while Negi tried to mediate, and Yue tried to save her notes lest Nodoka try to sneak in an intelligent item that allowed her to use disintegration at will and whose purpose was 'do anything Nodoka asks me to', Setsuna and Shakti volunteered to go on a snack run down to the convenience store before curfew. The latter felt she was off duty and not seeing Asuna and Ayaka actually fighting would let her justify actually staying off duty, and Setsuna was resigned to the fact she was the sort of person who got sent out on snack runs. Konoka, for her part, tried to sneak in a healthy dinner for everyone, but there was only so much one could do when you were limited to finger foods. In the end, she made some vegetable gyoza and was mildly successful at getting everyone to eat it instead of just chips, sugary drinks and cheap chocolate.

….

"Dearly beloved," Konoka said gleefully later that night, "we are gathered here in the sight of the great goddess Sarenrae and one another to ensure that the damned necromancer stays dead. He was tragically slain by getting knocked down on the street by a cart, which spilled fish guts on him, and caused him to be mobbed to death by alley cats."

"I can't believe I let you get away with that," Yue muttered.

"It's mathematically proven that in a fight between a PC and a cat of the same number of hit dice, the cat would win," Nodoka said happily. It had been her idea.

"It's not like any of you were druids or rangers… "

"I'm not sure I can use fireball like this," Negi said skeptically. "I mean, I've been using it on zombies all this time, and they've never caught fire and been consumed. I don't see why a normal corpse would be any different. Anyway, this one is fresher. Surely all his bodily fluids will keep him from catching fire."

"I don't see why I can't make him a Bloody Skeleton too," Asuna said. "Even if you won't let me make him into a juju zombie, at least let me do that much."

"Because you're out of money for spell components," Yue said. "Skeletons cost money remember?"

"We're selling his spellbook anyway, we'll get the money from there," Asuna said.

"By the time you get back form the shop he'll be cremated," Yue said.

"Not from fireball, he won't," Negi said. "Seriously, I think we've all seen just how inadequate this spell is at burning human corpses. We should just let Asuna-san use her wand on him."

"No!" Konoka declared staunchly. "Undeath is an abomination against Sarenrae and we will not be complicit in allowing intelligent beings be defiled by its touch!"

"I'll tell Evangeline you said that," Asuna said.

"In the game Asuna, sheesh, don't be such a moral guardian."

"Again, why would McDowell-san care?" Ayaka asked, confused.

"We can use it for parts for a bone or flesh golem," Shakti suggested.

"Et tu, Ada?" Konoka said.

"Hey, meatshielding is a dangerous business."

"Why do people keep trying to do unnatural things to the dead?" Konoka sighed.

"Unnatural things like burning it with fire summoned by arcane forces?" Haruna said.

"That's a perfectly natural phenomenon. My goddess told me so when I prepared my spells this morning."

"Yue-san, does this setting have any aluminium?" Setsuna asked. "With that and a little rust we can save Negi-sensei from having to use up a fireball spell."

"I thought it was pronounced 'aluminum'?" Asuna said.

"Like many things, only in the United States and Canada," Negi clarified.

"Ah. As expected, I guess."

"There's also the archaic 'alumium'," Negi added.

"Not English class sensei, we didn't need to know that."

"Why do you need aluminium?" Yue asked.

"Well, with that we could make thermite," Setsuna said. "Very useful for destroying corpses and other evidence." There was a beat. "N-not that I'd know from personal experience." Beat. "Why are you all looking at me like that?"

"Wouldn't be worth it," Haruna said. "Historically, in pre-industrial societies, aluminium was more expensive than gold because of how hard it was to refine. And we're already short on cash, hint-hint."

"I'm working on it. Anyway, don't you have a profession check you can roll on for that sort of stuff?"

"Hey, as a demon-girl in the big city, it would be perfectly normal for us to be worried about expenses and income," Haruna said. "This isn't some small town. Sure, orphan loli prostitutes would be more common but working conditions would suck more and I wouldn't have any nice regulars who I'd know for sure wouldn't beat or abuse me." Haruna sighed nostalgically. "That was the nice thing of being a small town bicycle. You knew all your customers, there was a bond… " Beat. "Why are you all looking at me like that? In the game, sheesh, don't be such moral guardians."

"Why don't we just send the corpse to the temple of Pharasma?" Shakti suggested. "They'd know how to keep someone properly dead, I'd wager."

"No, I don't trust Yue not to pull a 'Corrupt Church' plot," Haruna said. "Best we do this ourselves."

"We could cut it in half and separate the body parts," Nodoka suggested. "You need an intact corpse to reanimate, and most undead that aren't intact corpses use the head. Remove the head and spine and it'll be incomplete enough to not be reanimateable, and if we crush the skull it can't come back as any of the other kinds."

Ayaka was shaking her head. "This is all well and good, but it's not going to work," she said.

"Why not?" Konoka asked.

The blonde pointed. "Yue hasn't destroyed his character sheet yet."

Everyone gave the librarian a suspicious look. She smiled.

"We're going to need potions," Haruna murmured.

….

- To be continued…

….

A/N: for all that they claim video games, D&D, TV and Coca Cola lead to violent behavior and 'impressionable youths', which seems to be newspeak for 'idiots', will act out what they see, moral guardians are always the ones who seem like they can't tell fantasy from reality. They also never DO THE RESEARCH. Morons.

….

Some days later…

Asun glared down at one of the English summer homework questions.

What is a 7-letter word for 'aluminium'?

"Cheeky brat," she muttered, but managed to answer it.

….

Please review, C&C welcome.

Until next time, this is Shadow, signing off.